Aimee lives in San Francisco. She hasn’t been well and so we decided to send her some flowers. We have always thought the best florist in San Francisco is Birch. It’s a very elegant place.

Their clients include:

  • Vanity Fair
  • Chanel
  • Hermes
  • Christies
  • Isaac Mizrahi
  • Bucheron
  • Ford Models

If Birch are good enough for them, they’re good enough for Aimee!

We placed our order without any difficulty. But then the difficulties began…and Birch got even better.

They contacted us to say our credit card had been declined, which we couldn’t understand, as it was working in the UK. We sent an email to Birch saying we would call to discuss. We spoke to them and, taking a deep breath and expecting the worst, said:

“We know it’s asking a lot, but could you deliver the flowers and we will pay you tomorrow?”

Their reply?

“Oh we’re delivering the flowers now. Don’t get stressed about it, yes, pay us tomorrow”

They’d never met us, we’re a tiny client, our credit card had been declined, we’re based 5,000 miles away and so in practise they stood almost no chance of getting the money if we didn’t pay, and yet they went ahead and delivered the flowers without us even asking!

Some would say that was foolish of them. We think it is one of the best pieces of business building we’ve seen. We don’t know why they did it. Maybe we did something that caused them to trust us? But we are now writing this. And we will recommend them at every opportunity we get.

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Flowers from Birch

In a world where the customer is increasingly having to prove themselves to the very organisations who claim to be customer focussed it is great to see a business display a value that we have never seen on any workshopped, researched, agonised over, list of company values: “Trust our customers”

It’s a value that has caused us to admire them even more , not just for their floristry. But of course not every business can behave like that, and many might lose out if they did, but we want to make sure that Birch succeed for acting as they did, hence this.

So if you want flowers in San Francisco, go to Birch.

But for goodness sake, go to them first and foremost for the flowers, not because they may allow you to pay late! Do it to reward them for their product and service, not to exploit them. You can find them at: www.birchsf.com

Oh, and our card had been declined as it had been processed in London a few minutes before it was processed in San Francisco, and so our bank thought there was a fraud risk. All sorted out now.